We will need to move her from her current reminiscence home costing $8000/month. The money she has left is in an account under my name. She receives $1100 from VA and $2200 from my dad's railroad pension. Should we apply for Medicaid now or wait until the money runs out?
But what could be a bigger issue is what medically “at need” mom needs to be for your states Medicaid program. LTC requiring skilled nursing care in a NH is covered by Medicaid. But for most states AL isn’t covered, and for some memory care isn’t either as neither are skilled nursing care. I’d try to have a care plan meeting asap to clearly see where mom is for “need”. Now if she’s not needing skilled there may be a waiver program that Medicaid does for MC or AL. I’d make this a real priority to find out.
The place she is now, do they have a sister facility that is a NH and takes Medicaid? If so, that would be where I’d go to look at first.
Regarding VA Aid & Attendance, if she segueways to Medicaid, the A&A will stop completely (she can get it suspended) and will go instead to a $90 a mo personal needs VA allowance. She can’t get both Medicaid & A&A. Medicaid is better as it pays all of the NH room & board costs. VA A&A is great for lower cost AL or for doing a spend down, like what you all did.
? For you? the $ in a bank account under your name, is mom’s RRR income & VA $ getting deposited into this account?